The Whore
by beckiscoming
Summary: A meeting with a woman who somehow utterly despises Myron and Win despite having never met them before leads Myron on a search to figure out why. The trail leads him down into a dark underbelly of the sports world and one of his own clients that he was better off not knowing existed. Warning for talk of extreme violence, disturbing imagery. Also they swear a little.
1. Chapter 1

_Author's Note - I've never tried to write fic based on written word before. I appreciate that this is a tiny category and no one shall ever read it, which makes me feel more easy about giving it a try. _

* * *

Win's appearance at the door of Myron's office came without a knock or a word of warning. It also interrupted the second straight minute of withering sarcasm directed towards Myron from his other associate, Esperanza Diaz. Neither of those things, the unannounced entrance nor the sarcastic diatribe, were at all unusual in Myron's life.

It wouldn't even have been worth noting if it weren't for the reason Win apparently came down to visit.

"You need to come to the club tonight."

Myron groaned, nice and deep and heartfelt. "I don't. Tell me I just _don't_."

The Club, which in Myron's non-WASP non-wealthy mouth would have had to be Capitalized, was one of Win's latest methods of amusing himself. Richstone Parlor, it called itself, example of the latest craze among the super-rich to try to create the country club atmosphere in the heart of bustling, dirty Manhattan. It had the usual elite upper-crust sitting rooms, a cigar bar, a restaurant where they printed a fresh menu with a fresh imported chef's name on it every day. It also had a couple of tennis courts, shuffleboard, backgammon, and an upper floor with vaulted ceilings (in a building that took up half a city block, mind) reserved for a putting green.

Win and his blond and blue-eyed whitebread chic fit in at The Club. Hell, it was made for guys like him, though since Win was Win he didn't go to enjoy it as much as to observe the movements of his brethren with his usual aloof bemusement.

Myron did _not_ fit in at The Club. The one time Myron had bothered trying, he had approached it the same way people approach TSA lines at the airport – confident that he had done nothing wrong but just as confident that he was going to be discovered and handcuffed for some crime he wasn't aware of committing. Gloves would be donned. Holes would be probed.

Win had that gleam in his normally placid eyes, though. A gleam that meant he was up to something and needed his partner in crime to be there with him.

"You do," he answered, Exeter-accented voice flat and bored with the world as usual, only that damned eye-gleam giving him away. "And wear the suit, Myron. My name can only influence the doorman so much."

Myron made another face. The Suit. Some kind of Hugo Boss number that simply appeared on Myron's bed in their shared apartment, after Win got tired of debating the issue of fashion with Myron. As was Win's style, he simply bought something without Myron's input, broke into his locked bedroom and left the garment bag on his bed.

"And where's my invitation?" Esperanza drawled from her seat across from Myron's desk. She barely glanced back at Win, eyebrow cocked.

Win flashed his thin, didn't-fool-anyone, just-for-manners smile. "Would Her Highness care to join us at the club this evening?"

And, just like they all knew she would, Esperanza shuddered and sank lower in her chair. "Jesus who is the lord, no."

Win looked back at Myron. "Seven."

Myron scowled. He could never get away with refusing that way. Sometimes he hated Esperanza. No, he didn't. "I still don't buy into the general premise here. _Why,_ exactly, do I have to drag my shapely Jewish ass to your ridiculous Club?"

Win smiled, a touch more sincere. "That's a long story, and it's easier if you just shut up and do what I say. But fine: last night I hired a whore, and-"

"Oh, goody." Esperanza twisted to face Win as if suddenly captivated by his presence. "I get a front row seat for today's episode of Misogyny Theatre."

Win smirked. It wasn't a secret that he had absolutely no respect for women as people. Well, women who he slept with, anyway. On a generous day he might allow that they were human beings, but for the most part they were simply too irrelevant to form an opinion on. Females in general he could consider people – Esperanza herself was a good example of this – but that required that they A: find some way into the incredibly exclusive circle of people whom Win actually cared about, and B: didn't have sex with him.

Still, he chose not to go on with the story, casting his smirk over to Myron. "Does it really matter?"

And it didn't. Win's whims could be serious or absurd, but either way Myron was usually along for the ride. Of course to make up for that Myron tended to get Win involved in some hairy life or death situations. Then again, those situations made Win inexpressibly happy.

Myron scowled harder. "You realize that our friendship is starting to skew in your favor, don't you?"

Satisfied, Win just sent a parting smile to Esperanza and turned, heading out the door.

Esperanza clucked at Myron's long-suffering sigh. "God, to have to go to an exclusive club and eat and drink fancy crap on someone else's dime. I don't know how you resist jumping out the window right now. Is it too public, is that it? Because I could bring you a knife, or a gun. Something you could use right here in the office."

Myron peered at her. "'Jesus who is the lord, no,'" he quoted back at her.

She grinned. "I liked it, myself. Vehement, yet effective."

No arguing with that. Myron sat back in his chair and sighed again, loud and gusty.

* * *

And yes, fine, the suit was actually completely stylish and well-cut and perfectly tailored to show off Myron's not-inconsiderable attributes to their fullest. The drinks were cold (though he really needed to talk to someone about the lack of Yoo Hoo in The Club refrigerators), the food delicious, and the price of it all not coming from Myron's bank account.

Still. It was so damned stifling.

The high, wood-paneled walls, the rooms as deep and echoey as cathedrals, the others around him ridiculous with their money and their whispers and their way of looking through him as if he wasn't even offensive enough to acknowledge.

Myron had been a visitor in Win's world off and on since they roomed together at Duke. He was no more used to it than he was all those years ago. Sure he could manage more sharp and stinging sarcasm than he would have dared a decade ago, but even that required that someone actually _talk _to him. Which didn't seem to be in the cards that night.

After about an hour of suffering through a club soda and shrimp appetizer and a veritable mountain of Rich Person Indifference, he made up his mind to leave.

Of course the moment that he stood to go was the moment that Win snuck up on him.

"There's a foie gras dish on the menu that will _absolutely_ change your opinion about the torture of ducks," Win said as he appeared from some black hole and moved around Myron and the small table he'd claimed, pulling out a chair and sitting with a snifter of cognac already in his hand.

Myron glared at him but sat back down. "I could be at home eating poptarts and watching Starsky and Hutch."

"Yet you don't sound grateful to me for sparing you that. Puzzling." Win grinned. "There's someone coming in I want you to meet."

"You couldn't bring them by the office?"

Win shrugged. "I like public spectacles. More fun. Besides, I'm holding off on telling this person that you're the individual to whom I'm introducing them."

Myron's eyebrows lifted. Curiouser and curiouser. Not a potential client then, since Win played games with everyone except the people who trusted him with their money.

"I'm listening," he said, interested despite his mood.

Win glanced at his watch (a rare steel Patek Phillipe) and glanced towards the door (ten foot tall carved Macassar ebony), then settled back in his chair and lofted his drink. He swirled the snifter in that irritating way that people do when they care about more than how their drink tastes, which just seemed like a ridiculous waste of time to Myron.

"Very well. As I started to tell you earlier, last night I hired myself a little company."

Myron nodded, used to Win's nocturnal hobbies but interested in how hiring a hooker – something he did four or five times a week on average – led to an introduction at The Club.

"Long story short, the young woman refused to perform the services I was paying for." Win smiled at that, vague and bemused, though Myron knew better than to think that he was interested in a prostitute's motivations.

Myron whistled, low. "Exactly what was it you were asking her to my god don't even begin to answer that, I don't want to know."

Win smiled and shrugged. "Nothing out of the ordinary," he said, unembarrassed as ever. "We really hadn't even gotten down to the details yet. I simply introduced myself."

Myron's mouth quirked up into a grin at that. "Oh my God, don't tell me your reputation has started to precede you even with working girls?"

Win gestured a hand airily between them, one of those completely unselfconscious gestures that Myron never would have been able to pull off. "I give my companions nothing to complain about, assuming that they don't expect coffee and conversation in the mornings. They're well-paid, I'm attractive and I'm not cruel. It's the best they can expect."

Ego, yes, but Win had the galling kind of ego that came from truth. He wasn't unattractive – he had the porcelain, perfect features of something that might have been sculpted, not imperfectly born like those around him. And his callous attitude towards women aside, he wasn't impolite to them. They didn't matter enough to muster up rudeness. Myron was pretty sure that a woman who had to sleep with strangers all the time would take Win's handsome coldness over most of the other men who paid for her services.

Of course Myron might not have been the best guy to ask about the motivations of high-priced hookers.

"Shockingly," Win went on dryly, "I don't simply accept rejection, especially from someone whose services I am paying for. I refused her refusal."

Myron leaned in, ignoring the possibility that this story was going to a darker place than he imagined. Win was lethal, cold, a killer, a man who many people legitimately believed to be insane or close to it, but he was also extremely moral. In his own way, of course, and most people might not agree with his morals, but in Win's mind black was black and white was white.

And no one forced sex on another person.

"I raised my voice a bit," Win went on, drawling a bit as if bored with his own story, "then tried the quiet approach." He shot Myron a smile, aware and amused that people got nervous around him when he was simply being quiet and cool. "I even threw in a little _Les Miz._"

Myron thought about it, lyrics sifting through his mind. He chuckled suddenly. "'It's not for the whore to say yes sir or no sir. It's not for the harlot to pick or to choose...'"

"Mmm." Win enjoyed those games, lyrics and musicals and actors and other tidbits of trivia. Much like Myron, he even played when he was dealing with strangers, just for his own personal amusement.

"And?"

"She left," Win answered. "And right before she left she said, and I quote, 'even a whore who has gone to the bad won't be had by a rat.'"

Myron laughed. A prostitute with a working knowledge of the lyrics of _Les Miserables._ Interesting.

Win apparently thought so too, in his vague and aloof kind of way. "The woman simply despised me too much to stay, it appeared," he said, unbothered by the words. If there was a man who was used to being instantly hated, it was country-club-poster-child Windsor Horne Lockwood III.

But normally it didn't phase him. He was so used to it he hardly seemed aware of it happening anymore. Win had no use for people who judged him so thoroughly without so much as speaking to him.

"The things I miss when I go stay with my folks," Myron commented. "So what does your run-in with a disagreeable prostitute have to do with me schlepping my ass to this place tonight?"

"I wanted to test out a theory," Win said, sipping from his glass. His eyes went to the door again idly. "I hired her again."

"What?"

"I hired her again," Win repeated with that touch of sharpness he used when he had to speak words that he thought were redundant. "Triple the pay, no sex involved."

"For what?" Myron couldn't help but ask.

Win shrugged. "Testing out a theory," he said again. "She didn't despise me until she heard my name."

Myron blinked suddenly, glancing towards the door that Win kept looking at. "Wait, is she coming _here_?"

Win grinned. "I told Amanda to instruct her to dress nicely."

"You invited your recalcitrant prostitute to this repressive little hell of a building just to test out a theory," Myron summarized dubiously.

Win shrugged. His eyes were gleaming again. "I've been bored."

Myron rolled his eyes. So hard. "Some people play Scrabble."

Win smiled.

Since Myron didn't have to worry about repercussions, he was content to settle in and enjoy the show. Pretty Woman this would not be, he had no doubt, so he was curious to see what happened when Win's whore showed up.

They made small talk for a while, discussing clients, debating the similarities between Batman and the Green Hornet. Nation-changing conversation. Win ordered a second drink and the aforementioned foie gras dish that would apparently turn anyone pro-animal-torture. Myron contented himself with another club soda and a reuben, though Win and the waiter both rolled their eyes at his order.

"'I am what I am,'" he quoted at Win with a sniff as the waiter left, but of course Win immediately identified the _La Cage Aux Folles _quote and had to follow it up with speculation about how Myron might look as a cross-dressing showgirl.

Myron wasn't looking at the door, but he could feel the exact moment when Win's second guest of the night arrived. It was dramatic as any record-screeching bar entrance in a movie: conversation stopped dead around them, and there were audible gasps from some of the women. Myron even spotted an old, wrinkled bird sitting against the window clutching at her necklace. Scandal at Richstone Parlor.

Win sat up, eyes going to the door, mouth curling up on one side.

Myron finally looked over as well to see what all the fuss was about, already grinning in anticipation of a woman of the night dressed in whatever today's hookers considered to be fancy dress.

But the grin faded, and his eyebrows lifted, and he had to swallow back another whistle.

She was brown, which must have been the source of the reactions around them. Olive-skinned, as dark as Esperanza at least. Her nose had the unmistakable slope of Middle Eastern genes, her hair dark black and thick and worn loose, framing large, dark eyes and a full mouth. Her shoulders were bared with just the thinnest spaghetti straps holding up her dress, which was tight and not exactly modest, but a pale coral pink that glowed on her skin and seemed elegant despite the immodesty. She carried a strapless little bag in her hand – a clutch or a grab or whatever – and her shoes were the same slate gray as the bag. Cosmo magazine might have called her overweight, but if she had extra pounds they were the curving, lush, mouth-watering kind that Myron's college girlfriend used to have. Marilyn Monroe pounds. The kind that made a man's fingers itch to touch.

She could have been a deposed Arabian princess walking among commoners. Beautiful, exotic, and even if she didn't look like she belonged on a street corner she sure as hell didn't belong among the upper crust WASPs at The Club. Which Win knew perfectly well. It was probably the reason why he invited her here of all places.

If she knew why she was standing among the wrinkled white elite of New York, she gave no indication. Her eyes scanned the room before stopping on Win and Myron's table, and she instantly made her way over, looking at no one else, by all appearances not even noticing their stares.

Myron stood as she got close, and a moment later Win followed his lead.

The woman – hard to think of her as The Hooker anymore – ignored Myron and approached Win, which might have made Myron jealous if not for the flash of distaste in her expression as she reached him.

"Am I here just to scandalize your rich friends?" she asked, her voice soft with the trace of an accent. Arabian princess. Disney got it alllll wrong. "Because I have more appropriate outfits for that sort of thing."

Win didn't extend a hand, and she didn't seem to expect it. "Not at all," he said calmly. "I wanted you to meet someone."

Myron couldn't help but get a little flushed as he remembered that, yes, Win had invited her there strictly to meet Myron. It was Myron's time, baby.

He did hold out a hand, ever a gentleman compared to his cold best friend. "Good evening," he said. Myron Bolitar, king of unforgettable greetings.

Win cleared his throat as the woman turned and eyed Myron's outstretched hand before reaching out to accept the greeting. "I didn't catch your name last evening, forgive my manners."

The woman's hand was soft and small and warm and she gripped Myron's hand just tightly enough. "Sarayah," she answered Win, though her dark eyes stayed on Myron. "Don't bother asking last names, you wouldn't be able to pronounce it."

"Very well." Win sounded amused, though Myron didn't take his eyes off their guest long enough to confirm that. "Sarayah, this is my oldest friend, Myron Bolitar."

Mayday. Mayday.

It was a sudden, drastic change. A wall slammed behind her dark, glittering eyes, turning them instantly cold. She jerked her hand back, her eyes going to Win and then back to Myron, her expression intense. There was nothing in her face but pure unadulterated loathing.

"You sick piece of shit," she hissed, seeming to encompass them both. She backed a step away from Myron, who had to fight the urge to drift in her wake. Her hate-filled gaze went back to Win. "I'll tell you exactly what I told you last night – keep your money. I'll make sure Amanda knows never to send me to you again."

Win just looked at her, head tilted ever so slightly to the side. "The money was just for showing up," he said calmly. "You've done that, and so I'll pay-"

Her eyes flashed and she sliced him with a look cold enough to freeze hell over. "Don't." Her tone left no room for debate.

Surprisingly, Win didn't even try.

She turned on her heel, chin lofting higher as she seemed to remember the assorted horrified rich people in the room around them. She strode towards the door, the same wounded royalty amongst commoners that she had been before, just in a hurry this time.

Myron watched her go with a slight whimper of loss. But under that, quickly gaining volume, was a voice of reason looking past that angrily-flouncing derriere in the tight pink dress and turning back on the short introductions.

He had no doubt, whoever that woman was she absolutely loathed Myron and Win. Anger that strong came from something, something deeper than the usual disliking of privileged rich WASPs or charming hustler sports agents. That kind of anger was personal, intense.

But he was positive that he had never laid eyes on the woman before. A woman like that stuck in a man's mind.

The heavy wood of the clubhouse doors opened and then shut behind her, and she was gone.

Myron stood looking after her, and finally managed to have himself a witty, concise, dazzlingly clever reaction: "Huh."

"Mmm." Win came up beside him, gazing at the door before turning to Myron. "It's rather interesting, wouldn't you say?"

Myron nodded. Interesting was definitely a word he would use.


	2. Chapter 2

_Author's Note: I just want to say that I love this story and have been working on it but I never actually thought people on here would read it. :) So you few but quality people have been a nice surprise. I'll update more now, promise._

* * *

The story left Esperanza underwhelmed, to say the least.

"Let me see if I've got this straight," she said, eying Myron with that old, familiar look that didn't know if it wanted to be amused or disgusted. "Some woman doesn't like you..."

"Uh huh."

"...and that's it?"

Myron shrugged. "She really, really doesn't like us."

"_I _really don't like you! You're not shedding any tears for me."

"Please. You love me."

Her eyes rolled up to the ceiling. "Okay, let me ask you one question, and then I'm storming out of here in disgust."

"Got it."

"Would you care about any of this at all if this woman wasn't hot?"

Myron blinked, surprised. What did how hot she was have to do with anything?

"I wouldn't even know about her if she wasn't hot," Win answered instead, completely impervious to all forms of feminist anger. "So no, I suppose not."

Esperanza's lips thinned but she shook her head, tossing her hair as she followed through with the aforementioned 'storming out in disgust' threat.

Win smiled faintly to himself, amused as always by the few women in his life who made it through to the inner circle. "I'm used to being hated, of course."

Myron nodded. "But." He was a sports agent, after all, considered by many people to be a step below parasitic leech. Somehow his stimulating personality wasn't enough to charm those people.

Win hummed. "But I'm used to knowing why I'm being hated."

"Exactly."

"So I'm more than a little curious. And it has been such a dull week otherwise," Win went on, his words slowing, drawling.

Myron narrowed his eyes. "What did you do?"

"Called PT."

Myron blinked. He sat back. "You thought the best way to handle a disagreeable Woman of the Night was to sic the FBI on her?"

Win rolled his eyes. "PT has no interest in busting a prostitute. He isn't going to go after her, and he won't be doing any research that she'll ever find out about. Just a basic check to see where she's been and how she might have come to know about us."

Myron opened his mouth to disapprove.

"All I did was skip the part where you angst about possibilities for days and then arrange some ill-fated meeting with the woman that ends disastrously, before you give in and call PT yourself."

Myron shut his mouth.

Win smiled, amused. "Besides, by bypassing that inevitable disastrous meeting between you and this woman, I'm hopeful that I'm also bypassing the part of this whole mess where you believe yourself to be falling madly in love and become _incredibly_ boring in response."

Again, hard to argue with that. Love was a strong word, but Myron might've developed himself a nice little infatuation. He would have enjoyed the hell out of it, though. That was one seriously beautiful woman.

Sarayah. His mind had whispered it at him all night after she left, adding stresses and accents to it. Sarayah Bolitar had a nice ring to it. As much as anything could ring with Bolitar attached to the end like a lead weight.

Win laughed suddenly, thin and cool. "I see I made the right choice getting in front of this. Get that ridiculous look off your face and call PT. See if he's got anything yet."

PT had something.

"_Sarayah Cheemalavagupalli, AKA Sara Cheevers. Busted for solicitation exactly one time five years ago, so if she's still working then she's damn good at not being caught." _

Win just nodded, unsurprised. Myron knew that discretion was a big part of the high-priced hooker business, so it was nothing he didn't expect.

"_She's an import, mom's from Lebanon, dad from India. She came to the States as a teenager and got naturalized after her folks did. Dad's a bigwig at Microsoft, nothing fishy there. And that, gentlemen, is almost all I can tell you. This woman's got exactly one arrest on her record, not a damn speeding ticket besides that." _

"Almost all you can tell us," Win said clearly towards the speaker.

"_Mm, got a hit on her name in another police report, but not as a perp. Your girl here nearly got herself killed a couple years ago. Assault and battery, and let me tell you. These were some seriously sick people, and they wanted to hurt her bad, maybe wanted to kill her. More than one, and they were pros. Hell of it is? I've seen this report before. I think we got a request for a profile back when it happened. No use, though, these were obviously hired muscle. Profiling hired help is a waste of time." _

Win and Myron exchanged looks. "Promising," Myron said to Win's nod. "Can you email me the report?"

"_Don't ever let it lead back to me. You know the drill, fellas. I'll forward it to both of you." _

Win reached out and disconnected the call without a word – PT was used to Win, of course, but Myron still bristled a little at the incivility of it.

"What's the chance you hired someone to beat a woman to death a few years ago?"

"I'm gonna say slim," Myron answered. He hesitated, eyebrows high. "What's the chance you..."

Win shook his head, his eyes going cold for just a few moments.

A ruthless beating that looked professional. Win had been known to leave those in his wake. No hired men involved: when someone needed to be dealt with, according to Win, he simply dealt with them. But Win had that intense moral code of his, and if he ever so much as hit a woman he would have remembered everything about it. He would have known this woman at once when he first laid eyes on her.

Myron didn't bother finishing the question, or so much as believing the idea behind it for more than that instant. But it was enough. Win's cold eyes thawed, but not entirely. He'd noticed. Damn it.

Luckily Myron had been sent a way to distract them both. He pulled up his email and instantly saved the attachments PT sent them. He reflexively stored them on his hard drive before he even opened them.

There were three files, all thoughtfully labeled by PT: Arrest, Police Report, and Photos

Myron opened the photos first. No point digging into the rest if this wasn't the right woman. There was always a chance that there was more than one woman named Sarayah around.

The file had about ten pictures inside. Myron tilted his monitor out enough that they could both see it as he opened the first one.

He could practically feel the blood draining from his face.

Christ, PT wasn't kidding. Someone had beat this woman at least half to death. Her dark hair – the only thing he could really recognize to compare to the woman he'd met the day before – was matted with blood, her face was discolored, swollen. Eyes swollen shut, lips torn and bleeding. There were two visible lumps on her head, goose eggs from a blow by a weapon.

Myron glanced at Win, mostly as an excuse to look away for a moment. Win studied the photo, expressionless, but there was the slightest furrow in his brow.

Myron didn't ask. Win would speak up when he was ready. He drew in a breath to steel himself and opened the next photo.

They were methodical pictures, taken by the police at the hospital. Front and back, close-ups on the worst injuries. Her stomach had been slashed almost raw, her collarbone had been broken. Broken ribs, broken fingers. The close-up shot of her hand revealed scrapes and gashes and blood that Myron recognized as defensive wounds.

She had fought back. She fought back hard.

He clicked through the last pictures fast, getting it over with, and then went to the police report. Win stayed silent and still in his chair, hardly seeming to breathe.

Another sick tug at his gut as he read through the police report. "Three of them," he said as he scanned, picking out the relevant parts. "Dragged her out of her car when she was stopped at a stop sign in front of her apartment building. One witness saw the three guys driving off, no one saw the beating. At least not that they owned up to."

He scanned through the pages, going to the supplemental reports as the cops updated about DNA pulled from under her fingernails, shoe prints taken at the scene, none of which led them anywhere.

One update about the victim made his frown deepen, and his body flush cold. "She was pregnant," he said out loud. "She miscarried the day after the attack."

Win moved suddenly, reaching over and taking the mouse. He closed the police report and opened up the photo file, and clicked right on a picture in the middle.

Her stomach injuries. Knife gashes, deep slices. Broken ribs. Myron spotted a dark bruise that looked like the corner of a huge shoe.

Win sat back, becoming a statue again.

Myron looked over at him, seeing the knowledge in his eyes. "They knew she was pregnant."

Men who beat women didn't focus on the gut. That was for guys kicking other guys while they were down. Women got hit in the face, the chest, the back. Women were usually too quick to protect themselves, they curled up and didn't uncurl for anything.

Three of them, to hold this woman still and slice at her stomach, kick her, break her ribs. Kill a baby.

Myron closed the photo. He opened the last one, the arrest report, and swallowed as he saw the mug shot attached to the file. That was definitely their woman, though she looked a decade younger and even more lovely and lush, which was hard to pull off in a mug shot. She was even smiling, like the arrest was a joke.

That was a year before the beating. Three years before Myron laid eyes on her.

The report was brief – the police were undercover at a strip club and arrested a half dozen girls for offering special back room services. Sarayah had been a first offender and had ended up being released the next day. Some of the other girls, the ones with records, probably weren't as lucky.

Myron found it hard to imagine the woman he met last night stripping. Even the younger, smiling version from the mug shot. She seemed like a classy lady. Though of course Win paid his service good money to send classy women to him.

He shut the report and sat back, letting out a breath.

Win was still for another minute, a cold but thoughtful statue still. Then he cleared his throat and relaxed in his chair. "What do we know now?"

"Well, it wasn't the arrest. Maybe we have nothing to do with any of it." He blinked. "Obviously we had nothing to do with any of it. So it's either something entirely unrelated, or..." Or she thought mistakenly that they were involved, though that seemed unlikely since they had never met the woman.

Win nodded, letting the 'or' sit there uncompleted.

Myron sighed. "So we know nothing now."

Another nod. Win reached over and picked up the phone on Myron's desk, dialing quickly. "Amanda, it's me," he said into the phone after a moment. "I need to know more about that Arabian princess of yours."

* * *

The good news was that Amanda the high-class pimp gave Sarayah's address without a fight. The bad news was that Amanda the high-class pimp gave Sarayah's address without a fight.

"So obviously I'll have to find someone else to take my business to," Win explained as he hurtled them through traffic, going at least twenty miles per hour faster than any other car on the road. "No telling what other information she would be willing to give out. To me, or about me."

Considering the way he was rocketing them down to East New York like he was strategically attempting to murder them both, his complaints seemed mild. Like he was just a bit inconvenienced by the whole thing. Still, Myron had a feeling that this Amanda woman was going to regret the loss of his business.

Win's fancy GPS screeched them to a stop in front of a fairly shitty apartment building in a side of town that Myron would not have willingly gone to alone. Win – the whitest man in Caucasian history, the embodiment of Windsor and money and polo as a valid life choice – climbed out of the car without a shred of hesitation and didn't bother to set the alarm on the three hundred thousand dollar car as he jogged up the stairs to the front door.

Myron just followed with a sigh. Win didn't hesitate because he knew that there was no trouble in the world that was bigger than the two of them together. Myron only wished Win was a little less confident about that. Seemed like the kind of chutzpah that would get them both into real trouble someday.

There was no security – the front door opened wide when Win tried the handle, and led right to a staircase going up. Win led the way, Myron glancing back only once to see the interested teenagers gathering around Win's ridiculous sports car.

They reached the third floor and headed down the hall side by side, and with a quick glance they traded places when they reached 321. Myron took the lead, knocking on the door firmly.

The building was silent and still around them – no doubt everyone in a five block radius knew about their invasion and were on their guard about it – so Myron heard the footsteps approaching the door, soft as they were. He saw the gleam of light from the peephole dim as someone peered out.

There was silence.

Myron cleared his throat. "We just want to talk."

A minute ticked by. Two.

To his surprise, the sound of a deadbolt sliding open reached his ears, and the door actually opened. Considering her hatred he'd expected more of a fight.

Sarayah herself appeared through the crack as she opened the door a few inches. She was obviously off the clock, no makeup, hair pulled back in a ponytail. She looked younger than she had at the club, but more drawn. Maybe it was the expression on her face as she looked out at them.

"Why won't you leave me alone?" she asked, her eyes wide and unadorned as they looked out at Myron.

Myron met her gaze steadily. "Because we don't know you," he answered.

She let out a breath and shook her head, not buying it, but she stepped back and let them come in.

The apartment was as small and shitty as the building implied. Myron was reminded of his college years – not of his own dorm, because he roomed with Win and Win never lived second-class. But he'd visit other guys and see their mismatched thrift store furniture, the milk crates as coffee tables and bare walls and whatnot.

It didn't fit. She was high-class, and high class hookers made bank. The kind of money Win threw around...she could have afforded better than this working one night a week at that kind of job. Especially in East New York.

Myron didn't say anything, though. He followed her into the cramped, bare living room with its nicotine colored walls, and he wondered why they had showed up without talking about it first. He had no idea what to say.

Win stood near the door, not following her as closely. "You think we were responsible for that beating," he said simply. "As deeply as you hate us, it couldn't be anything else."

She looked over at him. Her throat worked, her lips thinned. But as she turned to sit down on a worn, colorless armchair, she was still the regal woman who reminded Myron of displaced royalty.

"I know you were responsible," she said in answer, quiet but steady. Her gaze went to Myron. "At least I know that _you_ were. And you..." She looked back at Win. "You simply enjoyed it."

Win frowned, his temple furrowing.

Myron couldn't help but remember those photos still sitting on his computer at work. "Tell us why you think that."

She regarded him, and her eyes went back to Win for just a moment. "I knew it the entire time. Jason was more than happy to confess everything."

"Jason." Win's eyes were intent as he watched her.

Her lips thinned, and her hands were curled into fists on the arms of that worn chair. "Jason Patrick."

Myron sucked in a breath. His eyes instantly went to Win.

Jason Patrick was a football player. In the majors, but not a star. A good-looking guy, but rough, and nearing the end of his run thanks to a couple of injuries. Myron had been his agent since the day he left college. He was...not mid-range, exactly, but not Myron's highest-paying by far.

Myron had known him for five years. Still represented him. Got him a deal with a regional energy drink company a couple months back. And, of course, as with all of Myron's clients, Win had been handling Jason's money just as long, advising on investments and so on.

Sarayah watched them exchange glances, and she seemed to misinterpret the cause. "So can you stop the innocent act? Or have you arranged so many beatings that you honestly did forget for a while?" She flashed a smile, cold and thin. "Maybe you never saw my face before you tried to kill me, is that it? Do you send your hired men out without even glancing at a photo first?"

Myron crossed the room to her quickly. He sat down on a loveseat that was duct-taped to keep its stuffing in, and he regarded her solemnly. "I represent Jason for business deals. Win handles his finances. That is the beginning and end of what we do for him. We're not in the business of arranging beatings."

She shook her head. "I don't believe you. Jason said your name specifically."

Part of him wanted to leap up and storm out of there, find Jason Patrick and figure out what the hell was going on. But he couldn't move, not with that hatred still in her eyes.

"Jason was lying."

She scoffed, a faint sound. Her eyes moved away form Myron, over to Win and then away from him, too. "Why would he bother? He wasn't scared of me going to the cops. He didn't care about me, not about what I knew and not about..." She swallowed. "Anything else."

Her hand slid to her lap. No, higher, her stomach.

Myron swallowed, thinking about miscarriages and bloody slash marks on police photos.

"Why don't you just start from the beginning," Win said suddenly, leaning back against the wall where he was and watching her. His face was impassive, but the glitter in his eyes told Myron that Win didn't appreciate being accused of a beating like that any more than Myron did.

Her hand went back to the arm of the chair deliberately. She looked at Win. "You know, I saw you."

He frowned. "Impossible."

"Not the night it happened. Afterward, at the hospital."

Win shook his head, but his brow furrowed and then suddenly cleared, and he drew in a soft breath.

"You were standing in the doorway of my room when I woke up sometime in the night. You were reading the chart. You looked pretty pleased." She regarded him. "I was medicated, I think that's why I didn't place you right away the other night. But I always knew your name. Both of you. Jason's devoted agent and his sociopath yuppie friend who makes millionaires out of all his clients."

Win would normally have smiled his acknowledgment of a description like that. He was proud of his reputation, and it wasn't news to him that people thought he was insane. But he seemed troubled.

Which in turn troubled Myron. He faced Win, frowning. "You were really there?"

Win nodded. "I thought those pictures looked familiar. The one of your face. Those injuries. I was there."

"How? Why?" Myron didn't want to think bad thoughts – he'd done it for just a second earlier, in his office, and that was bad enough. But Win more than anyone didn't believe in coincidences.

Win flashed a smile, small and thin. "I got a call from PT. You remember he said he'd seen the report before? He called me up and asked if I was causing trouble on the east side, said there was a victim who looked like someone I might've left in my wake." He looked from Myron to Sarayah. "I was curious. I paid a visit. PT was wrong. They wanted to kill you, and you were still alive. That meant it obviously wasn't me. But it was good work. At least I thought so when I thought it was one person. For three men, it was just sloppy. There's no excuse for three men to leave a living victim if they wanted a dead one."

Sarayah turned away from him, looking unnerved by the confession. Myron couldn't tell if she believed him or not.

Myron regarded her for a long moment, the tension in her shoulders and set of her jaw. She seemed frail, though that was probably a ghost impression left by having seen those pictures of her at her worst.

"Will you tell us the whole story?" he asked.

She tensed even more, but drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. She rose to her feet, movements as compact and graceful as ever.

"I need a drink first." She left them to move through a small archway into a ridiculous mini-kitchen. She opened a small refrigerator and hesitated. She spoke without looking back at them. "Would you like anything? I don't believe your story, not yet, but I don't have access to any poisons."

Myron tried to smile. "Whatever you're having would be great, thanks."

Win stayed silent.

As she stirred into motion again, Myron looked back at Win. Sarayah didn't know what to believe, but Myron had no doubt. Win didn't believe in coincidences, but he believed even less in lying. He was honest to a fault, unashamed of himself, his origins, his presumed psychoses. If he had caused her injuries he would have confessed to it and then made some attempt to make amends, unless he thought those injuries were justified. But either way he wouldn't have lied to her.

Win only ever lied when he had to, in pursuit of a goal or to save a life. He despised dishonesty, which was one reason why he never made any attempts to cover himself in a less polarizing persona than the disgustingly rich and smug piece of white bread that he was.

He stood silently against the wall, in his peach polo shirt and tailored designer slacks, and there was trouble brewing in his eyes. Matter of fact, there might have been trouble brewing there since the day he walked into Myron's office and announced that he'd hired a whore and it all went south. Whatever Sarayah's reaction to him had been that first night, it obviously stirred up something deep in Win. Something that made him keep pressing the issue.

Sarayah drew Myron's attention as she returned, holding out a glass for him. He murmured his thanks and sipped, blinking in surprise to find it was nothing more than Coke.

She returned to her seat, smiling thinly at his expression. "I don't drink. It doesn't mix well with the medication I'm on."

He smiled to show his indifference, but lowered the glass to his lap and watched her silently.

Her eyes went behind him to Win, and then back to Myron. She sighed. "I suppose I must believe you a little, or else I wouldn't go through this in front of you." She sipped her own soda, thoughtful. "I met Jason a few months before it happened. I was a dancer. A stripper, in a club. I'm not claiming I was an innocent." She looked at Myron for a moment.

He just nodded. Nothing the earlier arrest report hadn't told them.

She relaxed a little at his lack of reaction. "When he came in with some of his teammates the girls went nuts. Hook up with a pro athlete, they all said, and it was like Christmas come early. They're rich, they're too young to be smart, and they're always trying to one-up each other. If one of them tips you fifty, the next one'll tip a hundred just to show he's better. And if you get one to date you outside of work, even better." She flashed a tight smile, bitterness in her eyes. "We were all stupid and young and just having fun. Jason took a liking to me. It wasn't hard to like him back. He was still new to the life, and he was so amazed by everything. The game and the money, the attention. It was...cute."

She paused, sipping her drink again. "I'm not going to say I started thinking about being with him long-term, but when I got pregnant it became a possibility. So I thought. But the minute I told him about it...it was like he turned into someone else. He was hysterical, he kept saying that the guys all warned him that whores like me try to trap them that way. He said I had to get rid of the baby. He was right – some girls considered an NFL player's baby to be a lottery ticket. Retirement. A few of them got out of the life that way. Poked holes in condoms, skipped birth control, did it on purpose. But that wasn't me."

Another pause, another intent look at Myron to check his reaction. "I know what I was. What I am. But I was never dishonest." She seemed like she wanted to say more, but shook her head after a moment. "Anyway. He started calling every day, five or six times. Wanted to know if I called the clinic, if I made an appointment, if the thing was dead. That's what he called it. The Thing." She drew in a breath. "I wasn't ready for a baby, certainly not one that had a father that thought of it in that way, so I made up my mind to have the abortion and be done with it. I just didn't decide that fast enough.

"The last time I talked to Jason," she said, her eyes landing on Myron and settling there, "he said that he'd talked to you. To Myron, his devoted agent. Said Myron gave him the name of a guy who was going to handle things, since I obviously wasn't going to do it myself." She stared at him. "I knew what he meant the moment those bastards surrounded my car. I knew what 'handling things' meant."

Myron shook his head, looking away from her, trying to think of what conversations he'd had with Jason Patrick three years ago. Way too many clients and meetings since then, though. One thing he knew: if Jason had told him there was a pregnant woman he thought was trying to trap him into a future of child support payments, Myron would not have given him the name of any guy.

She cleared her throat quietly in the pause. "I should have died," she said, and her voice was suddenly blank and inflectionless. "Instead the _thing _died, and I lived. I've got scars, bones that never healed right. I'm still on medication for pain, two years later. I've got a hundred thousand dollars in hospital bills and the payments get higher every month. I will never have a child. All because I didn't choose fast enough, and you gave him the name of a guy."

Myron shook his head again, more forcefully. "Never. If I have ever known the kind of men who consider it their job to beat innocent women into losing their babies...I would have seen them arrested. I don't support that. I don't support anything like that. If a client came to me about a pregnancy I would have recommended a doctor I know, and that is the beginning and end of it."

Win straightened from his lean. "And just who was your favorite doctor to recommend a little more than two years ago?" he asked, his voice casual, his eyes anything but.

Myron glanced back at him, but straightened. He sucked in a breath. The answer came to him like a bullet to the head. "Xinxin Lee."

Win's throat worked. He nodded, unsurprised.

"Christ." Myron looked back at Sarayah. "Doc Lee got busted about twelve months ago for handing out prescriptions like they were candy. Pain pills, sedatives. Steroids. Uppers and downers. He worked with athletes exclusively, and apparently he was..." He swallowed, his thoughts spinning down into an incredibly dark place. "He was known for providing any help his clients needed."

Oh, Christ.

He sat back, his breathing a little less easy. "I quit giving out his name six months before he got busted, after I sent him one of my clients for help and he dosed her into an addicted stupor. I don't get involved in treatment normally, I trusted him after he helped with my knee a decade ago. But I found another doctor to recommend after I got the idea he was more interested in money and drugs than healing people. I stopped...I never would have..." He swallowed. "I had no idea he was..."

She studied him, her dark eyes intent, digging. "You said he got busted?"

Myron laughed, thin and dark. "He only lost his license. No prison, no probation. He got busted the way rich doctors always get busted. After all...he never really hurt anyone."

He dropped his head in his hand and rubbed at his face. Christ, she was right. She'd been right from the start. Myron gave out Lee's name when Patrick mentioned a pregnant girlfriend, and when Patrick's problem couldn't be solved with medication Lee found another way to help him.

It started with Myron. It really was his fault. Her hatred was completely justified.

Before he could spiral down further into those miserable realizations, Win approached and sat beside him on the love seat. "That's five so far."

Myron glanced over.

Win's face was stone, his eyes deadly. He looked at Sarayah as he spoke, though his words were soft, directed at Myron. "Jason Patrick first, to make sure he did use Lee. Then Lee. Then the three men who did the job. Am I missing anyone?"

Myron understood. He laughed, hollow. "Me."

Win shook his head but didn't respond. "Looks like this is going to be a busy week after all."

"What are you talking about?"

They both turned to Sarayah, and Myron realized that instant that Win was wrong – Myron wouldn't have fallen in love with her. Not once he knew the truth. He would never feel anything for her strong enough to overpower the crushing guilt.

Sarayah regarded them, Myron's pained face and Win's stone stare. She drew in a breath. "You're going after them?"

Win nodded.

She swallowed. "More than two years I've been looking for someone to care enough to...and now you two. I've felt nothing but hate for you this whole time."

Myron couldn't meet her eyes. "You're justified."

"No." She reached out suddenly, a small, graceful hand landing on Myron's leg. "Tell me again. Tell me you only ever gave him the name of a doctor. Tell me you had no idea what he intended or what that doctor did."

Myron looked up, miserable, and it hurt to meet her eyes but the pain was good, like penance. "I swear to you, I had no idea. I would have quit working for Jason on the spot and sent Win after the doctor."

"Win would have gone after them both," Win stated. "Win _is_ going after them both."

Sarayah didn't look away. Her eyes dug into Myron's, sharp and intense. And after a moment she sat back, and when she blinked her eyes went bright with sudden moisture.

"Then it's not your fault," she said, the words faint. "If you didn't know then you have no reason to get involved."

Win shook his head instantly. "Even if Myron never gave him Lee's name, even if Jason never accused us of being involved, these are the kind of men who will maim and kill innocent women and unborn children to protect a percentage of their income. That is reason to get involved. More than enough reason."

Win rose to his feet, and Sarayah rose a moment later. If she meant to argue, though, she reconsidered.

Myron sat back, just trying to breathe under the load suddenly on his shoulders. He watched the two of them, the way Win's cold eyes softened just slightly as their gazes met. The way Sarayah searched him, disbelief still in her eyes.

Win raised an eyebrow when she didn't say anything. "Justice isn't always pretty, Sarayah. But it's still justice."

"Sara. Call me Sara." She stepped back and nodded. Her fists relaxed at her sides, and her mouth curved into a small smile. "Will you tell me when it's done?"

Win smiled at that, thin and cool. "I'll do more than that. You'll hear from me tomorrow either way."


End file.
